Toronto. – For his pioneering accomplishment as Filipino-Canadian journalist in Canada, Balita publisher Ruben Cusipag will be honoured with the “Life Achievement Award” at the Four Seasons Hotel on November 11.
Melinda P. Rustia, The Kol Hope Foundation for Children president, said Cusipag will receive the award during the Foundation’s Presidential Ball. Kol Hope is an international foundation based in Toronto, named after Kol Rustia who was born with a rare chromosome disorder.
Kol, 14, passed away October 9. The Foundation has raised over half a million dollars since its founding supporting Sick Kids Hospital, the Easter Seals, and Philippine-based orphanages.
Cusipag, now 73, was detained as political prisoner when Martial law was declared in the Philippines in 1972 by then President Ferdinand E. Marcos. Two years later, with media all under the control of the dictatorship, Cusipag immigrated to Canada.
In 1976, he co-founded Atin Ito News and Features, one of the oldest Filipino-Canadian newspapers, where he wrote political editorials highly critical of the Marcos regime.
In 1978, he put up his own newspaper, Balita, which installed him as the central figure of community journalism. His views then were highly sought and had become a resource for mainstream media outlets and the then rapidly growing Filipino community in the GTA.
In 1993, Ruben Cusipag authored the book “Portrait of Filipino Canadians in Ontario (1960-1990)”. It was his way of honouring his hardworking compatriots he dealt with during his early years as an immigrant in Canada.
Ruben is now wheelchair-bound due to a tragic vehicular accident in 1996. Since that time until the present Balita has been the number one community paper in the GTA. Under the management of his wife Tess Cusipag, the paper has now a digitized format in addition to the largest circulated printed form.